Coral Reef Monitoring in the OECS and Tobago, 2007-2009

Marcia Creary Ford1

1 University of the West Indies - Centre for Marine Sciences, Mona Campus, Kingston 7, Jamaica

Corresponding author(s): Marcia Creary Ford (marcia.creary@uwimona.edu.jm)

Received {date}; Revised {date}; Accepted {date}; Published {date}

Citation: Combination of authors, year of data paper publication (in parentheses), Title, Journal Name, Volume, Issue number (in parentheses), and doi of the data paper.

Resource Citation

Creary Ford M, M. Archibald, G. Brown, D. Chin, J. Defoe, P. Gayle, J. Gomez, L. Grant, S. Green, D. Henry, C. Issac, L. Jones-Smith, I. Kenny, L. Laurence, J. Mitchell, S. Nimrod, H. Prospere, N. Sang, B. Simon, H. Small, O. Spence, S. Steele, C. Stoute, D. Theophile, A. Titus, L. Wilkins, P. Wilson-Kelly, K. Wulf  (2018): Coral Reef Monitoring in the OECS and Tobago, 2007-2009. v1.1. Caribbean Coastal Data Centre, Centre for Marine Sciences. Dataset/Samplingevent. https://cloud.gbif.org/bid/resource?r=macc_coral_monitoring&amp;v=1.1 BID-CA2016-0004-SMA

Abstract

The objective of the Coral Reef Monitoring for the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and Tobago project was to strengthen the coral reef monitoring network in the region and to conduct an assessment of the coral reefs in these participating countries. In 2007 an agreement was made between the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC), the executing agency for the Mainstreaming Adaptation to Climate Changes (MACC) project, and the Centre for Marine Sciences (CMS) to implement this monitoring programme which was conducted during the period 2007-2009.

Keywords: Samplingevent, Eastern Caribbean, coral reef, video monitoring

Project details

Project title: Coral  Reef Monitoring for the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and Tobago (2007-2009)
Personnel: Marcia Creary Ford, Peter Gayle, Peter Wilson-Kelly, Sean Green, Omar Spence, Hugh Small, Brent Simon, Mark Archibald, Candy Stoute, Jullan Defoe, Jerry Mitchell, Craston Isaac, Derrick Theophile, Steve Nimrod, Graeme Brown, Lynn Wilkins, Kia Wulf, Laudiana Laurence, Hazelann Prospere, Sophia Steele, Lucille Grant, Addison Titus, Jonathan Gomez, Kahlil Hassanali, Kirwin Sampson, Kirwin Redman, Paul Phillip, Denise Henry, Denise Chin, Ivanna Kenny, Loureene Jones Smith, Nicole Sang
Funding: The publishing of this data set was supported through a small grant from GBIF/BID

Coral reef monitoring in the OECS and Tobago was implemented through a MOU between the UWI-CMS and the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre with funding from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) through the World Bank.
Study area descriptions/descriptor: The study area was comprised of seven islands located in the Eastern Caribbean; Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts & Nevis, Saint Lucia, St Vincent & the Grenadines and Trinidad & Tobago.  Each country selected coral reef areas for monitoring based on guidelines outline in the site selection protocol
Design description: Monitoring took place under the supervision of the Roving Team Leaders (RTLs) from the CMS in collaboration with local resources persons and volunteers. Each RTL was assigned responsibility for two countries. Each country selected coral reef areas (Operational Areas) for monitoring based on the guidelines outlined in the site selection protocol, taking into consideration the use to which the data would be put, the peculiarities of the area and any constraints that might be encountered during monitoring. Each country was requested to installed 20 permanent transects, each 20m long, at the selected sites. The video monitoring protocol was based on the Aronson method that utilized a high resolution video camera to video tape the substrate. The resultant videotapes were reviewed to ensure that clarity and resolution were satisfactory and then labelled and sent to the CMS for processing and analysis. The Pinnacle Studio™ software was used to capture discrete non‐overlapping adjacent images for each transect. The estimate the benthic cover from images was determined using the Coral Point Count with Excel extensions (CPCe Ver 3.5) software.

Data published through GBIF: https://cloud.gbif.org/bid/resource?r=macc_coral_monitoring

Taxonomic coverage

Taxonomic ranks
Kingdom: Chromista
Phylum: Porifiera, Chlorophyta
Order: Scleractinia, Alcyonacea
Common names: Corals, Gorgonians, Sponges, Algae, Algae

Spatial coverage

General spatial coverage: The following islands in the Eastern Caribbean: Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts & Nevis, Saint Lucia, St Vincent & the Grenadines and Trinidad & Tobago.
Coordinates: 10°55'15.6''N and 19°6'14.4''N Latitude; 64°5'38.4''W and 60°28'8.4''W Longitude 

Temporal coverage: 2007 - 2009

Datasets

Dataset description
Object name: Darwin Core Archive Coral Reef Monitoring in the OECS and Tobago, 2007-2009
Character encoding: UTF-8
Format name: Darwin Core Archive format
Format version: 1.0
Distribution: https://cloud.gbif.org/bid/archive.do?r=macc_coral_monitoring
Publication date of data: 2018-06-28
Language: English
Licences of use: Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 License

Metadata language: English
Date of metadata creation: 2018-05-25
Hierarchy level: Dataset